Great North Air Ambulance Service train young paramedics

TRAINEE paramedics are preparing for their careers by receiving training from some of the best in the business.

Doctors and paramedics from the Great North Air Ambulance Service (GNAAS) have delivered trauma training to the paramedics of tomorrow.

Approximately 50 second year paramedic students from Teesside University got a taste of the challenging scenarios faced by the GNAAS aircrew on a regular basis.

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The training was held at County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service’s training centre in Bowburn, County Durham, and gave students the opportunity to gain some practical hands-on experience.

Paul Burnage, GNAAS paramedic, said: “What we are trying to do is increase the critical thinking skills of the student paramedics and educate them on how to take care of a trauma patient.

“We’ve got a vast array of knowledge and experience within GNAAS and a number of subject matter experts so we can pass that knowledge on to future paramedics and that’s great.”

A range of different scenarios were set up for the students including extrication of a patient from a vehicle involved in a road traffic collision, patients with traumatic brain injuries, patients with catastrophic haemorrhage and paediatric patients.

Chris Brown, a student paramedic said: “Today’s been a real insight into the trauma that we might potentially have to go to as a newly qualified paramedic.

"It has illustrated the key importance of forward thinking, and how that affects care of patients that we’re going to see.”

Another student paramedic, Danielle Bestford, said: “The scenarios are really realistic so it’s obviously going to benefit us when we go out in the future.

"It reinforces everything we’ve been learning as well.”

This was the third trauma training day ran by GNAAS and there are already plans in place to run another one next year.

GNAAS, which rescues hundreds of severely injured or ill patients every year across the North-East, North Yorkshire and Cumbria, wished to thank the fire service for its support in running the training sessions.

For more information about GNAAS, visit www.greatnorthairambulance.co.uk.

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